Each year I go through and put together a year in review video. I pull pictures and videos from the things I did and what made me happy that year. 2017 was a tough year. But looking back through, a lot of good happened too. A lot that made me smile.

As always, and very sadly, I can never include everything in these. And this year, there seemed like more that I had to cut due to time constraints than ever before. These are just some of the things that I did last year, and some of what brought me joy. Here’s to the new year.

Each year I pull together the year in review videos that I see, and don’t worry, I am working on my own year in review video (although it might come out a few days after the New Year).

First up, the amazing video from Google:

DJ Earworm returns with his mashup of the year:

And here is this year’s Youtube Rewind, which, I really actually don’t like that much, mostly because there are only a very small few of these creators that I recognize and watch, but it’s still kind of fun:

After the election, I knew four couples who quickly got married, afraid that we would lose the right. And that’s a fear that straight people don’t understand. The few civil rights we have are new, and are still fragile. And as it turns out, they might have been right to be so worried:

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday let stand a Texas ruling that said the right to a marriage license did not entitle same-sex couples to spousal benefits under employee insurance plans.

That decision was followed up with the arguments in Masterpiece Cake Shop which looks to use the bullshit idea of ‘religious freedom’ to hide bigotry and legal discrimination. There are a lot of lines being drawn between this case and the racial discrimination case Piggie Park Barbecue from the sixties.

If a business is open to the public, what they sell should be available to all of the public. The baker would be just as wrong if he declined to make a wedding cake for a black couple, citing his religious beliefs. If you sell a product (in this case, wedding cakes), you should not be able to put restrictions as to who you will sell it to, that would take us back to the times of delis with signs saying they would not serve Irish and lunch counter sit-ins.

Telling minorities who have suffered a history of discrimination that it’s unneighborly, unseemly, or discourteous to fight for rights that they’re being denied but you’re enjoying is shameless—ultimately just another mechanism for denying those rights in the first place. Do you actually think the minority members love always having to be the loudmouths reminding the world that they deserve the same rights as you already have? And to the extent that some activists become almost permanently wedded to the “angry activist” position, can you really blame them?

Alright, let’s see what we have today. First up, in a great bit karma, a man who was refused a legal marriage license by Kim Davis is running to unseat her. And she had to watch him fill out the paperwork.

The trailer for season 3 of Eastsiders looks great (and even includes a stop in Pittsburgh)! But sadly, Colby Keller is in it, so I may not watch it because of that (although I think this was filmed before he was doubling down on his white privilege):